Interstate 355 (Veterans Memorial Tollway) opens to traffic on Monday November 12, 2007 between Interstates 80 and 55. The 12.5-mile freeway was built in three years after more than 10 years of delays caused by legal and funding issues. The 2005 toll increases throughout the Illinois Tollway network helped pay for completion of the $738 million route that includes a 1.25-mile Des Plaines River Valley bridge, the second longest span in the state. [...]
Denied before, North Carolina again sent their request to add an Interstate designation to a stretch of U.S. 264 and U.S. 117 between Wilson and Goldsboro at the recent AASHTO Annual Meeting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. This time, the application was approved. Among the benefits of a new Interstate for Goldsboro, North Carolina, the designation allows trucks exceeding 48 feet in length to legally drive the U.S. 117 freeway between the [...]
Since our friends decided to leave early, we followed suit and made a day out of it on the way back south. Decided on Interstate 89 south to check out the Barre Connectors first, both of which appear as freeways on maps sometimes, but really are expressway-like roads with no private driveways. Vermont 62 spurs east from Exit 7 into northern Barre, complete with a connector leading to U.S. 302. [...]
Spent our final full day in Vermont visiting Burlington and the University of Vermont. As always with this trip, we took convoluted routes to see more of the area. Departing Interstate 89 south via Exit 16 (U.S. 2 & 7), we traveled through Winooski, an old mill town situated along the north banks of the Winooski River. Redevelopment of the downtown area is phenomenal when compared to previous visits in [...]
Lubbock, Texas is a city of about 250,000 smack on the middle of the Caprock - an oil and agricultural rich perfectly flat region in West Texas. The city is also in the process of getting its third freeway, named for retired Texas Tech basketball coach Marsha Sharp. What's the deal with naming freeways after people who are still alive? I thought you weren't supposed to do that. Click any [...]
Check out this NY Times Article on highway signs, their fonts, their history, and Clearview. Blame the Clearview scourge on the elderly, and good salesmen, I say. IH 45 north at Beltway 8 Spot the clearview above... Is highway gothic really that "dangerous"? In its use since 1949 how many hundreds of people have been maimed or killed on our nations highways because of a font? [...]
As much of the country is aware, the Interstate 35W bridge over the Mississippi River collapsed during the peak traffic hours of August 1, 2007 near downtown Minneapolis. Without any notice, the 1964-built bridge deck plummeted into the waters of the Mississippi 64 feet below, sending drivers and their vehicles into the river in an instant. It remains unclear as to what was the exact cause of the bridge failure, [...]
The 2008 State Budget for Delaware passed this Summer and in it are changes that will affect many drivers through Delaware. At stake in the $3.28-billion budget are increases in tolls on both Interstate 95 at the Delaware state line and the SR 1 Turnpike between Dover and Christiana. Tolls for Interstate 95 will increase from $3.00 per passenger vehicle to $4.00. Each of the SR 1 Turnpike plaza tolls [...]
A recent trip from Florida to Biloxi shed some light on new and ongoing construction projects throughout the upper Gulf Coast. First, a widening project is well underway now along Interstate 10 through the Tallahassee area. Dubbed "Moving I-10 Forward", the work involves widening the freeway between milepost 194 and Exit 202, reconstructing the U.S. 27 half-cloverleaf interchange with more graceful ramps, and adding new ramps between Interstate 10 and [...]
19 miles of the 37-mile stretch of future Interstate 49 between Interstate 220 and the Arkansas state line are currently under construction. Despite a $280 million shortfall, the $560 project is still expected to be completed by 2012. As mentioned in a previous blogpost, Arkansas has completed most of future Interstate 49 from Texarkana southward toward the Louisiana state line. Dubbed Arkansas 549, the new freeway ends three miles north [...]
